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Saturday, November 04, 2017

Cranberry & Almond Sourdough

Sourdough is about as good as it gets for bread. Homemade. Slightly tangy. Chewy crumb. And that crust. This is not a normal bread recipe with commercial yeast that is fluffy and soft, made in your mixer, and done start to finish in a few hours. This will take all day or up to 24 hours. It is mostly hands off but you do need to be around to stretch and fold the dough. It is artisan bread; made the old-fashioned way.

I don't explain how to make a starter, or how to stretch and fold dough. You can go to You Tube and look up videos on how to make sourdough bread. Or buy the book Tartine. Or educate yourself over at the blog The Perfect Loaf. Or do all of the above like I have done. This is just my favorite version of a fruit and nut sourdough bread. It assumes you have those skills already.

THIS IS NOT A FIRST-TIME SOURDOUGH RECIPE. Not because this isn't easy (it is), but because I am scant on photos for illustrating each step.

1. Put
sourdough starter and water in bowl and mix all together with your hand. Add
flour and mix until flour is all incorporated. Cover tightly.

2. Let sit 30 minutes
to 2 hrs covered.

3. Add the salt to the top of the dough and mix
it up the best you can with one set of stretch and folds.

4. Do one more
set of Stretch and Folds, 30-45 minutes apart. On the second Stretch and Fold,
add the fruit and nuts. Don’t worry if all the fruit/nuts don’t get mixed in
right now. They will on the next stretching. Do 1-2 more stretch and folds
every 30 minutes. If my dough seems strong I skip the last, if it seems limp I
might add another.

5. Let the covered
dough ferment on the counter or in the oven with the light on in the same bowl
for another 2 hours until it is about 1.5 times the size. If my kitchen is cold
I can let it go 3 hours.

6. Divide dough
in half, pre-shape the dough on a
lightly floured board into a round.

7. Let sit for
20 minutes covered.

8. Shape loaves
as desired and put into well floured banneton baskets or floured cloth lined
bowl. (Cloth should be a tea towel or other lint free towel.)

9. Place
bannetons in a plastic bag that you “blow up” with air, secure it close with
twist tie. Put it fridge overnight to bake the next day.

Or to bake the
same day, let it rise another 2 hours then bake right away.

10. 30-45
minutes before you are going to bake turn oven to 475 degrees and place baking
vessels in the oven. (Either a dutch
oven, combo cooker or cloche). I use cloche bakers.

11. Score the
loaf and place bread in pan. I use parchment paper to transfer to the pan.

12. Bake
covered at 475 for 25 minutes and remove cover. Turn oven down to 400 degrees.
Continue to bake for 15-20 minutes until bread reaches internal temp of 205.
(You might need to play with the temp and time depending on your oven.)

*This is a 76%
hydration dough, increase or decrease to your desired percentage.

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About Me

I sure love cooking, sewing, my kids, modern machine embroidery, and decorating. I started meringuedesigns.net in 2007, a great place for modern embroidery designs. I live in Utah but I'll always be a California girl.